


I would all misgivings break (If only for thy sake)

by Meatball42



Series: Rare Pairs [53]
Category: Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel) - All Media Types
Genre: Civil War Fix-It, F/M, M/M, Multi, Polyamory, Post-Captain America: Civil War (Movie), Spies & Secret Agents, Team Dynamics
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-09-17
Updated: 2017-09-17
Packaged: 2018-12-25 14:08:39
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,640
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/12037506
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Meatball42/pseuds/Meatball42
Summary: After the Civil War, the Avengers have returned to their headquarters, but that doesn’t mean all the wounds have healed. Maybe it’s good timing for Bucky to be called away on a mission.





	I would all misgivings break (If only for thy sake)

**Author's Note:**

  * For [kiss_me_cassie](https://archiveofourown.org/users/kiss_me_cassie/gifts).



> You said you liked multishipping, so... this ended up quite multi. Hope it works!

_Vicious blasts of energy, lasers, and explosions from missiles lit up the dim silo as Stark, powered by wrath and protected by his Iron Man armor, held off Captain America and the Winter Soldier both in his raging thirst for revenge._

_Bucky dodged the deadly attacks and ran and let Steve intercept his teammate’s anger, but when Stark managed to pin Bucky against a wall, all the fight went out of him. Steve was across the hangar, still winded from Stark’s last strike, and Bucky knew that Steve wouldn’t be able to see the moment his friend stopped running. Bucky let his arms drop to his sides and stared down the glowing repulsor aimed at his face- the last thing he’d ever see._

_Except, it wasn’t._

_The metal hand lowered slightly, enough to let the man behind the mask see his face. “You’re giving up?” Stark said, breathless and disbelieving, after a tense moment._

_“...I guess,” Bucky panted._

_“You guess? You escaped Hydra, played keep-away with Rogers for years, survived the Black Panther, and now you’re gonna lay down and let me kill you?”_

_“I didn’t kill the King,” Bucky answered. “His son didn’t deserve to kill me.”_

_Stark’s machine stands frozen. Forty feet away, completely within super-soldier earshot, Steve whispers Bucky’s name._

_“I’m sorry,” Bucky tells the emotionless metal face of Iron Man. “I wish I could undo all of it. I wish I’d been stronger. I wish I could make it better. But wishes don’t change anything.”_

_No one moved. The repulsor glowed at Bucky’s neck, Steve held his stance ready to throw the shield, and far above, the wind of the Siberian tundra whistled across the top of the pit._

_The suit let go of him. The metal arm lowered the glowing blue away from Bucky._

_“They really don’t.”_

 

~ ~ ~

 

  
Coming up to the end of the couch, Tony throws something. “Think fast!”

Bucky snags the crumpled ball of paper out of the air about six inches from his face. On the massive flat screen at the focal center of the room, his character is gutted and blood spatters across the frame.

Beside him on the couch, Sam crows his victory, even as Rhodes (who has to battle the winner) protests interference from the armchair to their right. Vision watches the spectacle with interest from the breakfast bar, where he’s waiting nearby while Wanda cooks up potato pancakes.

Steve simply rolls his eyes, smiling at his teammate’s antics. He’s sitting on the floor at Bucky’s feet with the bowl of potato chips in his lap, waiting for his own turn in the competition. As Bucky unfurls the ball of paper, he keeps an eye on Steve as Steve watches Tony and Tony blatantly ignores him.

Bucky inspects three lines of nonsense printed at the bottom of the otherwise blank page. “What is this?” he asks.

“No idea,” Tony replies. “Our resident sneak sent it through the _fax machine_ , which is the modern-day equivalent of Morse code passed on a string between two cans, so I’m assuming it’s spy stuff.”

Bucky eyes the text again, this time looking for any indications that it could be deciphered.

“She helpfully sent instructions to get your ass down to SoCal for the weekend,” Tony continues. “So if you see her, tell her that Iron Man is not her carrier pigeon, and any future top-secret intel can go FedEx. Stop by if you need a tune-up before you go, but otherwise, don’t break a leg, and give my love to the work wife.” He left the room as he spoke, so that the last words were said over his shoulder in the doorway.

Scrambling up from the floor, Steve rushes after Tony. Bucky is still blinking in confusion by the time Steve is out of sigth; he still has trouble sometimes with processing verbal information quickly, and Tony doesn’t like to slow down for anyone or anything. “Work wife?”

Sam shakes his head, cueing up the new game. Bucky passes the controller over to Rhodes. “It’s a joke from after SHIELD went down. We ran a few missions with some of the agents Nat and Hill cleared personally. You remember the blonde who gave us our gear back?”

A smile grows on Bucky’s face, matched by the smirk on Sam’s. “You talking about the day Steve found his game?”

“Hey, I might be nervous too if I was trying to date Agent 13,” Sam admits with a grin. “That’s an intimidating woman.”

“I remember.” Bucky’s smile fades as he remembers fighting against the blonde agent and Natasha.

Noticing the change in mood, Sam leans in, speaking over the start of game music. “It’s not gonna be a problem for either of you, is it? Working with Steve’s ex, now that the pair of you settled all your longing looks?”

“No difference to me,” Bucky says, scowling at Sam for the phrasing. “And Steve-”

“-Is used to having his cake and eating it too,” Rhodes interrupts coolly. His eyes are intent on the screen, but his expression is tight.

Sam and Bucky share a look, but let it go. When Steve slinks back into the room a few minutes later, shoulders slumped in disappointment, they don’t say anything about that, either.

Bucky does bring it up again, later, after visiting Tony’s lab for a check-up on the prototype composite-polymer arm he’s wearing. As soon as he’d walked out of the lab, Tony was itching to be off, and barely ten minutes later his Maserati is speeding out of the compound without another word to anyone. Their suite has a view out the front of the building, and Steve watches the flashy red sports car fly down the road into the woods.

“No dice?” Bucky calls from the kitchen.

Steve stands at the window long after the car’s out of sight. Eventually, he comes and leans against the counter, where Bucky’s shucking corn. “Pepper won’t talk to me either. And my badge doesn’t work at the Tower.”

“Hell hath no fury,” Bucky says sympathetically.

“I didn’t do anything to _her_ ,” Steve grumbles, quietly enough that Bucky doesn’t feel the need to explain to him why that doesn’t matter. Steve already knows; he just needs to complain.

“Rhodes is pissed, too,” he comments instead.

“But he’s an Avenger,” Steve agrees, picking up Bucky’s meaning. “He has to talk to me. Doesn’t mean he has to be nice.”

“It’s better when Tony’s not here,” Bucky admits, setting a pot to boil and dropping the cobs in. “Everyone can forget for a while. Wanda and Vision, too. Wanda gets twitchy, and Vision goes quiet.” He turns back and finds Steve leaning half over the counter, face pale like he’s been punched it the gut.

Bucky hesitates, standing awkwardly in the center of the kitchen. Maybe once, he would have known instinctively what to do, how to make Steve feel better. But no matter how much he remembers, some things won’t come back, and other things have changed too much, even when he can remember. Living with Steve is like walking an old, familiar path, and every so often tripping on uneven ground he ought to know by heart.

“I thought that, when we all came back, we’d be a team again,” Steve murmurs, slowly, thinking over each word. “We were supposed to be friends again. Tony and Natasha- they got us pardoned, you- Tony forgave you.” Steve looks up, then, and Bucky wishes he could brush away the pain in those blue eyes as easily as he can brush the trailing hair away from them. “Why can’t he forgive me?”

“I wasn’t sleeping with him,” Bucky answers simply, stroking over Steve’s face to rest his hand on the back of his neck. He squeezes, comforting, even as Steve’s expression crumples.

“He was with Pepper, or I thought he was, and- he said no strings attached, anyway.”

Bucky shakes his head. “I wasn’t his friend,” he rephrases.

“I’m still his friend,” Steve whispers.

There’s nothing to say. Steve is miserable for the rest of the night, even when he tries to put on a happy face. Bucky’s always been able to see right through him- that, at least, hasn’t changed. When they go to bed, Bucky doesn’t try to start anything to distract him; he just curls around Steve as best as he can and wishes him sweet dreams.

 

~ ~ ~

 

By the time he gets to San Diego, Bucky’s deciphered Natasha’s message, so he finds the La Jolla cafe where he’s supposed to meet Agent 13 without any difficulty. Her disguise doesn’t trip him up either; he can see right through her nondescript brown hair and sundress. But he finds himself hesitating anyway, hovering outside the cafe for a brief moment. He’s comfortable with the Avengers for the most part, nowadays, but new people still set him off-balance.

Not to mention, most people aren’t as relaxed about going out with multiple people as Steve is.

She looks right at him, though, as he lingers by the door, so he has to come in. She stands to shake his hand and invite him to sit down, sounding like a normal, friendly lady. If he hadn’t known, Bucky might not have guessed she had nearly as many successful missions under her belt as Natasha. There’s even coffee on the table for them both already, still hot like she knew exactly when he’d arrive.

“I don’t think we’ve ever been properly introduced,” Agent 13 says, with a tilt of the head and a sweet smile that simultaneously acknowledge and dismiss the fact that he’d slammed her through a table the last time they were in a room together. Bucky finds himself smiling back, set at ease despite his worries.

“I’m Bucky. You’re the work wife,” he attempts to joke, and when her smile turns into a delighted grin, “Tony says hi.”

“I’ll never forgive him for that nickname,” Agent 13 insists, laughing. “And how is everyone up there?”

Bucky thinks it over. “Improving,” he says after a minute. It’s even true- for most of the team.

Agent 13 raises an eyebrow. “It’d have to, right? Tony let Steve talk yet?”

“No,” he says shortly.

As if sensing his sudden suspicion, Agent 13 raises an eyebrow. “I wouldn’t be much of a spy if I didn’t know what my cousin was going to do, would I? Tony’s good at grudges, particularly if they’re personal. He’ll get over it eventually.”

For the first time ever, someone reminds Bucky of Natasha; mostly in the sense that he feels like they’ve planned the conversation out and he’s being left behind. “You’re Tony’s cousin?” he asks. “But you don’t think he’s right to be mad at Steve?”

“Sort of cousin. And I get where he’s coming from, but- Tony’s a hero. He’s never been an agent, or a soldier, like us. He doesn’t understand just how far ‘need-to-know’ goes.”

Thoroughly unsettled now, Bucky fiddles with his mug of coffee, staring down at the dark liquid. Agent 13 lets the silence linger comfortably. Pieces click together that he should have figured before- would have, if he hadn’t been distracted. _Sloppy_ , he chides himself, but another part of him is perking up, shaking off the dust.

“There’s no mission, is there?” he asks, positive he’s right.

“Nat said you guys were acting like high schoolers.” Agent 13 says bluntly. “I’m no therapist, but I know Tony, and Steve listens to me- once in a while. She said you’re the one with an in, and the only one with the skills to mediate a reconciliation, so I should give you some advice.”

Bucky thought he was tired of fighting. He’d moved into the Avengers compound on the condition that he’d only be behind the scenes, unless they really needed him. He’d wanted to be retired, to live as quietly as was possible, being who they were.

But the undercover meetings, even as low-pressure as this, he did miss. Natasha’s code was a challenge to break, the kind of work that had been thrilling even in the middle of the war. And that glint in Agent 13’s eyes, the way she leaned toward him over the table, ready to disclose secrets-

Maybe there was still a place for him, one that didn’t involve being a guided missile aimed at an enemy.

“What do you think?” she asks, but the twitch of her lips says she already knows he’s on board.

“I’m in,” he agrees. “But first, tell me your name.”

Agent 13 blinks in surprise. “Oh, Steve didn’t tell you? I’m Sharon Carter.”

“Sh- _what?_ ” Bucky chokes and has to gulp down his coffee. “You’re-”

“Her great-niece, yeah,” Sharon says, watching him with the air of one encountering an old, tired joke. “Let it out.”

“You- Steve’s-”

“Really, breathe, Barnes. Just say it, you’ll feel better.”

“Steve’s seeing Peggy’s niece?!”

“There you go.” She hands him a napkin. “Yeah, it’s kinda weird, but Aunt Peggy was in her sixties when I was born, so really, once you get past the time travel, it’s not that strange to me.”

Bucky chokes again, laughing, and Sharon rolls her eyes. “Are we past it?”

“Gimme a few weeks,” Bucky coughs out. Now that he looks, he can see it in the purse of her lips, her broad shoulders, and he can’t be suspicious anymore. Nat okayed her, and if she’s anything like Peggy, Tony and Steve will be begging for mercy by the time they’re done. “Okay, let’s make a plan.”

Two cups of coffee later, with the sun sinking low over the beach, Bucky feels oddly light. When he returns to New York, he knows just what to do to get Steve and Tony talking to each other. Actually resolving anything will be on them, but that no longer seems like an impossible task, either. He feels hope, that the Avengers will be able to heal, and he knows now that he has an allies in both Natasha and Sharon for making a life that’s just his, too.

“Thank you,” Bucky says sincerely as they’re leaving the cafe. “I owe you one.”

“Nah.” Sharon tosses her hair with the hand that brushes aside Bucky’s words. “Just do me a favor.”

She steps in close to him on the sidewalk, her sleepy blue eyes twinkling. She goes up on tiptoe and leans in to kiss his cheek, lingering. “Give me a call when things get settled. I’d love to catch up with you and Steve.”

She winks, and while he’s still frozen and flustered, pulls a moped out of nowhere and zips away.

 

~ ~ ~

 

“I still don’t know how you did it,” Sam says in wonder. He glances at the kitchen, where Steve and Tony are arguing over dinner, with Rhodes laughing at them both. It’s the best sight the room’s seen in a long time.

Bucky takes advantage of Sam’s distraction to perform a complicated maneuver and smash away all of Sam’s remaining hp. “I’m just that good,” he says smugly, as Sam turns back to the TV and chucks his controller onto the armchair in disgust.

Bucky laughs, then, faux-casual, asks, “Hey, Sam. You’ve never wanted to sleep with Steve, right?”

Sam stops with his beer halfway to his mouth. “Uh, no?”

Bucky nods. “And you’ve never wanted to sleep with me, right?”

“Ugh, no,” Sam says with a shudder. “I’m not into guys, and even if I was, I wouldn’t touch your pasty ass.” He shoves Bucky on the couch, and Bucky shoves back before they settle and Sam cues up a new game.

“Good,” Bucky says thoughtfully. “Cause I think it’s about to get more complicated around here.”

“ _More_ complicated?” Sam snorts. “I’d like to see that.”

Bucky watches the blue moped turn the curves up the driveway, and smiles to himself.


End file.
